DAYTONA BEACH, Fla., -- The motorcycle world converged on Daytona International Speedway for the past three days to participate in the annual Dunlop tire test in preparation for March 3-11 Daytona 200 Week.

More than 20 riders from the factory teams such as Honda, Ducati, Yamaha, Suzuki and Kawasaki tested on both Saturday and Monday in preparation for Daytona 200 Week events, which culminates with the 65th Daytona 200 By Honda on Saturday, March 11. Sunday’s second day of testing was rained out.

“This test is huge,” said Eric Bostrom, who is joining factory Yamaha in 2006 and will compete in the Daytona 200 By Honda. “Everyone knows that Daytona sells a lot of motorcycles. There’s a lot of pressure on us to do really well here. This (test) is it. That’s why you see a lot of Japanese engineers here. There’s a ton of importance put on this test because of how important this race is.”